Will embryonic stem cells help Parkinsonics?
Embryonic stem cells will help cure Parkinson's diseaseAnna Govorova, Infox.ru
Scientists led by specialists from Lund University (Sweden) managed to obtain dopamine-releasing neurons from human embryonic stem cells, and then implant them into the brains of laboratory animals with Parkinson's disease. Surprisingly, these neurons started working, and the animals recovered motor function.
As the authors say, they hope that their work will make a great contribution to the development of methods for treating Parkinson's disease using stem cells. According to them, a successful preclinical trial of this method allows planning and launching clinical trials.
Parkinson's disease is a severe neurodegenerative disease, one of the causes of which is believed to be the destruction of dopamine–synthesizing nerve cells in the brain. Dopamine is the most important neurotransmitter, that is, an intermediary in the transmission of a nerve impulse from neuron to neuron. It is necessary not only for pleasure (dopamine is called the pleasure hormone), but also for movement, learning, and in general for the work of the brain. The main symptoms of Parkinsonism are difficulty in movement, impaired coordination, muscle rigidity, tremor.
As scientists say, currently, there are no effective methods of treating Parkinson's disease, therapy only helps to reduce symptoms, but often the use of drugs for a long time ceases to bring results. Cellular therapy of Parkinson's disease is currently considered one of the most promising methods.
In their study, the scientists used human embryonic stem cells. Embryonic stem cells are not embryo cells at all, as it may seem. Embryonic cells are considered to be from the blastocyst, which develops on the 2nd-5th day after fertilization. The source of embryonic stem cells is unused blastocysts after in vitro fertilization (IVF). These cells are pluripotent – they are able to form different tissues and can turn into 220 different types of specialized cells.
With the help of special technology, scientists have turned embryonic stem cells into dopamine-releasing neurons. Then they placed the resulting neurons in the part of the brain of rats with Parkinson's disease that controls movement. As the authors say, these neurons have taken root perfectly. After six months, they began to produce the necessary amount of dopamine, moreover, these neurons formed all the necessary relationships with other parts of the brain.
According to the lead author of the study, Malin Parmar, their work is an important stage in preclinical trials of the treatment of Parkinson's disease using dopaminergic neurons derived from embryonic stem cells. "Our results show the effectiveness of this method," says Parmar (in a press release from Lund University Stem cell transplants for Parkinson's disease edging closer – VM).
As the scientist adds, their data show the same good result as the use of fetal stem cells for the treatment of Parkinson's disease – cells at the stages of fetal development following the blastocyst. But the use of fetal stem cells is associated with ethical issues. Now scientists have managed to find an alternative to this method.
The results of the research by Swedish scientists are published in the latest issue of the journal Cell Stem Cell (Grealish et al., Human ESC-Derived Dopamine Neurons Show Similar Preclinical Efficacy and Potency to Fetal Neurons when Grafted in a Rat Model of Parkinson's Disease).
Diagram from an article in Cell Stem Cell – VM
Roger Barker from the University of Cambridge, commenting on this study in an article published in the same issue of the journal Cell Stem Cell (Developing Stem Cell Therapies for Parkinson's Disease: Waiting Until the Time Is Right), discusses the possibilities of using dopaminergic neurons to treat Parkinson's disease in clinical practice. However, he believes that there should be no hurry here. "Before the start of clinical trials, it is necessary to analyze the entire history associated with the development of these methods, all the mistakes that have been made. And here it is important not to rush, because unprepared clinical trials can cause damage and negatively affect the development of regenerative medicine," Barker believes.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru07.11.2014